


Freiheit Tea House

by Lily_Icerem



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Tea House, Angst Free, Coffee Addictions, Lots of Tea, M/M, Moderately paced relationship build
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-01-10
Updated: 2014-01-10
Packaged: 2018-01-08 05:17:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1128790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lily_Icerem/pseuds/Lily_Icerem
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Levi is dependent on caffeine, five cups of coffee a day is quite normal for him. Unfortunately, he finds that it also gives him painful stomach-aches while also curing his migraines. Struggling to choose between caffeine withdrawal symptoms and an upset tummy, he stumbles upon a tea house under the recommendation of a barista. </p>
<p>He finds that he can’t stay away from the place after his first drink. The tea is great, but what really gets to Levi is his server, a young music student with a sweet, but subtly shy personality, and a strangely captivating passion for tea. </p>
<p>It all starts with a cup of Liquorice and Peppermint Tea.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Freiheit Tea House

**Author's Note:**

> I should be working on Desire's Parade, but I've wanted to get this idea out ever since I has that idea for DP, so I think it's fair that I write this one first. My goal was to get Eren into this chapter, but unfortunately, Levi just wouldn't shut up, so Eren will appear in the next chapter. This one's short and is all about Levi... see the connections? 
> 
> This has been only very quickly beta-ed, so please feel free point out any mistakes that have been missed.

Levi is a business man, and a busy one at that. He wouldn’t call himself a work-alcoholic, but he is definitely a hard worker. Although, if you owned half the place you worked at, you’d be too. S&L Corp., the company he and Erwin Smith have established, dabbled in everything from film to private school shares, publishing to food, real-estate to tiny paperclips. People don’t realise that they’re responsible for a lot of things, but behind those shiny labels, it’s really just S&L Corp. shovelling in their consumers’ money.

This wasn’t what Levi used to do though. He and his partner in crime, Erwin, used to work freelance, selling companies piece by piece. They would either wait for naïve owners to make mistakes or they’d use sly, but completely legal ways of making companies have to sell themselves. They would then swoop in and buy those companies, separate them into smaller companies and finally sell them to larger corporations; these places would then fear of meeting the same fate. They were and still are feared throughout the industry, although maybe slightly less.

The creation of S&L Corp. wasn’t intentional in the least. Over their years of breaking up companies, they accumulated many that they thought that had too much potential to let go or companies that they just really liked. They kept those running under their own names, but then they kept for that system to work anymore. Only then did they realise that they had the beginnings of something bigger; S&L Corp.

They bought a building, filled it up with many workers for their many establishments and businesses, made the top floor their office, and Levi stole the room with the better view. It’s different, at least they get less threatening messages from ex-owners, angry about their now non-existing companies, but it is so much more work.

Late hours, stacks of paperwork, completely unreasonable lawsuits, weird and eccentric employees, whiny employees, stupid employees, totally incompetent employees and having deal with those many employees is now a part of Levi’s day to day life. There’s also many, many, headache-causing, sleep-inducing, boring meetings that make Levi want to either shoot everyone in the room or just himself, the pain is usually too much to bear anyway.

What helped Levi get through his day was not his business partner because the bastard actually enjoyed this shitty job – and Levi’s suffering, judging from Erwin’s amused expressions – but cups of coffee. Many cups of coffee.

The liquid gold has been through everything with him. High school, college, hangovers at conferences… Erwin’s lectures about having hangovers at conferences.

Unfortunately for Levi, this trusty old ally has turned on him recently. Every time he drinks coffee, his stomach starts to ache. It would start from a very slight, almost unnoticeable throb, and increase to something that made him feel nearly queasy by the end of the day. This happens because Levi won’t stop drinking coffee, reason being?

Levi isn’t addicted to coffee, yes, he liked its smell, its taste and the overall lifestyle that coffee brings, but that’s not it. Levi doesn’t stop because he’s dependent on caffeine.

Every additional cup made his stomach hurt more, but every cup he missed from his average five, would make his head thump painfully like someone is hitting it repeatedly with a bat.  

He has tried to cut back, but skipping coffees made him tired but unable to sleep, very irritable and unable to concentrate. His alertness went down and his headache didn’t leave until the next day where he added to his caffeine intake.

It’s a problem, yes, but not a problem that he has the time to solve.

xxxXxxx

Levi strides out bedroom, wrapping a scarf around his neck. He feels like shit and could really go for a coffee right now, but he can’t bring himself to make one. He’d have to clean the machine after, because there’s no way he would leave it to dry dirty, and let’s face it, instant coffee, isn’t really coffee.

Sighing, he throws on his coat and heads out. He’d just have to wait until he gets to work where there’s a café in the building across from theirs. Levi gets his coffee there because one, they have good service and two, it just so happens to be one of the small branches they own. Lining up isn’t much of a problem.

When he gets there, annoyingly, like most mornings, so is the morning rush. Levi walks around the line to the side of the counter and gets Petra’s attention.

“The usual, Petra,” Levi asks in a casual tone.

The barista smiles and, and prepares Levi drink. Less than a minute later, she places his order in front of him. “Your morning usual, a large, triple shot latte on-the-go.”

He nods his thanks and walks out of the café, some waiting customers look at him with frustration, while the regulars take no notice of him. Levi comes in every morning anyway.

He goes for things with milk in the mornings because on one hand, it made up for the breakfast that Levi never eats, and then on the other hand, he better keep it light until he really needs it. Straight coffees are for the meetings, otherwise, how could he possibly make it through the day?

Levi makes his way across the street where S&L Corp. is located. The floor of the lobby, he happily notes, is shining like a mirror, so clean that he can see his reflection. Selling that old cleaning company and swapping for another one was the right the decision. The previous people were useless, absolutely incompetent. Not to mention sloppy.

Taking the executive’s elevator, Levi drinks the last of his coffee, feeling a little more human than he did before. They recently acquired an airline company that was doing well, but lacked the funding to continue. Naturally, a meeting is required. At least, that’s what Erwin thinks. Levi, on the other hand, prefers to handle the paperwork, rather than spend hours on end discussing how they intend to earn more revenue and all that crap. Also, he’s heard that the person in charge was a rather eccentric man who likes to play guitar while discussing important matters. As amusing as that sounds, Levi would like to give that a pass.

Unfortunately, this is not avoidable, if it is, than he would have missed a lot of meetings already. He’s not a people person, and never will be, especially if they were talking _at_ him and not _to_ him.

The charming little ding at the elevator brings him out of his thoughts, and he steps out onto the top floor. There isn’t very much there, it consisted of his and Erwin’s offices each with their assistants’ desk in front of the doors. Tucked away in the corner, is a moderately size kitchenette, equipped with its very own industrial espresso machine with a coffee grinder sitting next to it.

He is one of the people in charge, but it doesn’t set a great example to go out every time he wants coffee. So, one of the criteria’s for being his assistant is they needed to know how to operate an espresso machine. Although Levi prefers going out to the café to get his caffeine hit, he doesn’t lower his standards when he was short on time. Again, instant coffee isn’t really coffee, and he favours fresh espresso over brewed or filter coffee. He can send his assistant to the café, but that doesn’t give him much time to drink his coffee. Espresso needs to be consumed within a short time its making, otherwise the flavour changes and the whole thing goes to waste.

He frowns at the empty seat where his current assistant, Boris, should be sitting. Levi’s gone through many assistants because human resources must think it’s funny to send him either people who are decent with work but can’t make a coffee to save their lives, or people who can make coffee but are incompetent little shits in everything else. It is completely unfair since Hanji picked to be Erwin’s assistant instead of his, claiming that she loves Levi, but doesn’t want to be ordered around like a slave by him. It’s a shame since she has a good touch with long blacks. He’s been stuck with switching assistants for so long that he just gave up and chose Boris. He doesn’t make great coffee, but it’s decent, and he wasn’t a completely moron either.

Being late isn’t something that Boris does, so where is his assistant?

Levi opens the door to his office and is about to sit down when Erwin pokes his head into the room.

“Levi, change of plan, we have a meeting with Sina Films.”

He irritably straightens up, “What? I thought we were talking with Scouting Airways today.”

The taller man nods understanding Levi’s frustration, but continues to explain what’s going to happen. “It seems that Sina has bribed them to switching times. I heard something about ‘urgent artists at work’ and ‘getting things done before inspiration disappears’. You know, the usual bullshit that they throw at people. Boris and Hanji are preparing for it now.”

“Damn it,” Levi curses. “When?”

“In five minutes.”

“Fuck.”

xxxXxxx

Sina Films is a company that makes obnoxious demands about funding and claims that it’s all worth is due to artistic flare; they will never understand. For once, Levi agrees with them. He will never understand why the Sina still plans on giving money to directors that can’t direct for shit. Yes, they didn’t _lose_ money, but they didn’t making that much either. Those stupid films they claimed that would make millions came close making absolutely nothing.

The projects had been a complete waste of time, and gave both Levi and Erwin enough stress to send a normal human running off the nearest cliff. Luckily, neither are normal.

So here they are now, choosing which projects to run and which to kick to the curb.

This isn’t easy because the folks at Sina were relentless bastards that just won’t shut up. They talk about the same things over and over again. Sometimes they change the wording, but most of the time they just repeat the same lines.

Three and a half hours, five arty-farty tantrums, six milk-curdling glares, four massive arguments, nine subtle threats, and two very close calls of someone (guess who) murdering every idiot in the room later, Levi is onto his forth cup of coffee for the day, and they are _still_ arguing about the same bloody topic.

Levi is completely ready to throw his chair at the window and then proceed to jump out of it, but just when he is about to make a start to his stuntman career, Erwin calls a break.

Damn it, sometimes that bastard can be a saint.

Without another word, Levi goes back up to grab his coat, flees the building, and crosses the road with much haste. Walking (almost running) to the café, he opens the door and orders an extra-large, long black on-the-go before he actually has time to see who he’s talking to.

Luckily, it’s Petra who takes his order. “Coming right up.”

He is quickly handed the cup, and like a chain smoker takes a deep drag from his cigarette, Levi takes a long, almost desperate drink of his much needed coffee. The jitters in his hands stop, he feels his headache lessen, and his irritable mood lighten just a little bit.

His head says _‘Oh, hell yes!’_ but his stomach says _‘Bitch, please’_.

Levi grimaces as he feels the effects of the strong coffee go straight to his already upset tummy. He leans on the counter that’s behind him and sighs; maybe this wasn’t such a great idea.

“Maybe you should lay of the coffee,” Petra says from behind him. The café is quiet at this time, talking is fine since there’s not very many customers.

“You know I can’t do that.” Levi takes another drink from his cup.

“No, you just can’t be bothered,” retorts Petra.

He’s about to defend himself, but is cut off.

“Don’t say you did, because we both know you didn’t actually give it a serious try. If you really wanted to get something done, then it would be done.”

Damn it, she’s right. Levi huffs with his back still against the counter. “Then what do you suggest?”

Petra’s smile brightens and a flicker of something suspicious appears on her eyes. “There’s a tea house down the road that opened last week. They specialise in many types of teas, and have absolutely no coffee in the shop. The boy who served me, although I’m not sure if he actually works there, really sounded like he knew what he was talking about. Maybe he can help you with your coffee addiction!”

“Mmhm,” Levi hums and turns around to look Petra properly in the eyes. “There’s something else. Are you implying something about the boy?”

“Oh, Levi, can’t get anything past you, can I?” Petra laughs. “The boy is such a sweetheart, I think he’s name is Eren… Levi, I’m sure you’ll like him.”

“Tch, what you make you think I’m going to go?” He crosses his arms.

The tinted blonde smirks. “Because you’re curious now, I’m not Hanji; I don’t constantly attempt to play match-maker. You’re curious about who this boy is and why I think you’ll like him,” she says, smug expression on her face.

Fuck.

“I’ll go after work.”

Levi turns and walks from the café; coat flapping behind him dramatically. In his head he can hear Petra giggle at him with a triumphant grin on her face. He shakes his head; maybe he should get that checked out.

The short man with an even shorter temper sighs mournfully as he heads back for more rerun episodes of _the Adventures of Sina Film: Rubbish of the Curb_. 

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you liked it! Tell me what you think, will you? I really need to go and work on Desire's Parade before someone else asks me when I'm going to update... I really hoped no one would ask me that. 
> 
> My tumblr is eren-does-christmas-differently, you can harass me about updating there if you feel I'm slacking off :)


End file.
